The Great Spider Debacle or YIKES, I don't know what to do!

While I can't say for a fact this was Mr. Hairy Legs, they are at least related.

Yesterday was my little friend Macy’s first day at the new theater group her mother signed her up for. She was so excited. Because Mom works, she asked me to pick Macy up from school and entertain her for about an hour and a half and they take her to ‘The Calico Cat Company’ theater group. Since I thoroughly enjoy spending time with Macy, I thought, sure why not. Macy is six years old.

The policy at Macy’s school is you drive up this one-way street where the kids are waiting to be picked up on a porch. Each car takes it’s turn stopping at the stairs as a teacher diligently inspects each vehicle to be sure you have the proper clearance to pick up the child you are requesting. (Actually, that’s how it’s supposed to work, but you pull up, call the child’s name and as long as they seem to know you and come to the vehicle willingly, nobody questions a thing.) Anyway…after following said procedure, Macy walks around the front of my vehicle and comes to the rear door on the passenger side to enter. (I should probably mention here that the place where you are required to stop is barely at the crest of a rather steep hill – and it’s helpful to know that my car has a manual transmission.)

Macy says “Hi” to me through the open window and opens the back door. The next sound out of her mouth is a shrill, blood curdling scream. I look over at her through the open door and see three bright orange and black hairy legs of a spider that has to weight about forty pounds. I’m trying to calm Macy down, when she starts screaming, “I don’t know what to do,” while standing there staring at said spider. I’m trapped behind the wheel with one foot on the brake and the other on the clutch, not sure how good my emergency brake is, when I holler back at her, ‘slam to door and get in the front.’ Sheesh!

Macy complies and scrambles into the front passenger seat. Next, I make a fatal mistake.

I ask one of the teachers, supervising the children for help. I explain that there is a GIANT spider on the car and can she please come around the side and kick it off for me. She comes around the side of the car and shrugs while telling me there is nothing there. I think oh shit sheepskin; it’s in the door jamb, so I tell her to open the door. Sure enough, there he is all huge and orange and hairy (remember I still can only see about three legs of him, but I’m sure he was smiling and evil grin.) Again I ask her to kick it off into the street.

Does she do that? NOOOO, she takes her hand and flicks him into the backseat. Then she looks up at me and says; “ah, oh. I guess I didn’t do too good.” Are you kidding me lady, and you are in charge of children. I just smile and thank her anyway as she slams the door.

Macy is now huddled on the front seat refusing to put her feet down on the floor. I drive away, every few second feeling this creepy crawly on my leg. Yeah, you guessed it, we spent the next hour and a half tooling around town doing errands, just the three of us; Me, Macy and Mr. Hairy Legs.

Later that night, I had to get someone, to hunt him down (Mr. Hairy Legs), kill him and remove the carcass. They tried to minimize his size, but I wasn’t hearing any of it. That sucker was 40 pounds of hairy, scary, trantulaness.

Ah, life in paradise. So what was your Tuesday like?